
HOW TO HAVE FUN IN A TOY KINGDOM STORE

WELCOME TO TOY KINGDOM
We arrived at Sandton City slightly earlier than 11 am, just to make sure we were on time for our appointment with the folks from Toy Kingdom. At this point, I wasn’t sure who was more excited, us dads or our son. It’s not every day that you get asked to visit a toy store and play to your heart’s content … or is it?
If you’ve watched or read about Charlie and how he got to experience the Chocolate Factory, this honestly seemed to be a similar experience, like we had bought THE last chocolate bar that had secured us an entry into Toy Kingdom!
Toy Kingdom had invited us to visit one of their stores as part of their #HeroDad campaign. You would have to agree that there’s no better way to be a hero to your child than letting them know that we’re off to a toy store. An exciting ‘teaser’ for the invitation was that we were informed that we were in for a mini “Amazing Race” experience as well as a morning of exciting tasks that had to be completed by both father and son.
KEEPING THE JENGA TOWER UP
On arrival at Toy Kingdom, we were met by Byron, our contact for the day. The first interactive activity was the JENGA tower which has the potential of keeping you occupied for a long time. I had decided I was going to document the day, so the game was between Darren, Byron and our son. Each took turns pulling out a wooden brick, taking care not to bring down the tower that Byron and his team had set up before our arrival. Gently does it, with one player taking a brick from a random space in the tower and placing it on top of the tower. It wasn’t long before the tower started to wobble and come tumbling down when dadD, aka Darren, attempted to take a brick out from the middle of the tower, much to the delight of our son and everyone else watching.
JENGA is a great family game and an amazing way to get the family engaged during the winter and of course the summer holidays.
MASTERING THE FLYING BALL WITH LIGHT
At this point our son became a little overwhelmed, so Byron introduced him to the world of drones controlled merely by the close proximity of the human hand aka Flying Ball With Light, no controls needed! Drones are a favourite of our son’s so he took to this gadget really quickly, but soon realised that it wasn’t that easy to control as it might have seemed initially. Up and down he maneuvered the drone around the store entrance. However it wouldn’t hover just over our son, and soon both son and drone were on their way out the store entrance, leaving our son both excited and apprehensive. Is dadD following me? As much fun as it was, our son had decided that he wasn’t quite ready for a drone of his own just yet.
I, on the other hand, am keen to acquire one or two of these ‘hand drones’ and take them to the park the next time we visit.
BLOW THAT BALLOON
So onto our next task, blowing balloons. I must admit, my own childhood memories of sore cheeks came flooding back when we were first told what the next activity would be. I need not have worried. Byron demonstrated how easy it was and before long our young man had mastered it and was showing dadD how it’s done. I loved how we were soon joined by a few other kids that had obviously dragged their moms into the store and were also blowing a balloon or two with us. As you may have guessed it wasn’t long before the balloons started to burst followed by loud shrieks of laughter from all the kids.
This is a wonderful and very unique item to add to your next birthday party goodie back.
EGG ‘N SPOON
I vividly recall all my years at primary school during Inter-House Athletics where the Egg ‘n Spoon race was always included… for the lower primary kids. When Byron mentioned that this was the next activity, I was super keen to see how our son would manage it. With the egg on the spoon and our young son, accompanied by another child in the store, they started making their way around the in-store magic path. The path winds through the aisles and shelves, all the way back to the front where the “race” had started. Just before the end of the tongue-in-cheek, eyes-fixated-on-the-spoon experience our young man dropped his egg and became despondent. The most important lesson from this activity was that no matter the outcome, everyone’s a winner for simply competing.
HERE COMES LEWIS HAMILTON
The favourite part of the morning for our son was the opportunity to drive a remote car around the store. He thoroughly loved it even though it took him a little while to master the concept but he was soon racing his way around the store and had to be coaxed to part with his new found passion when we had to move on to the next activity.
IS IT A BEAR, A DOG OR A TROLL
Our final activity was the making of our son’s very own friendly Bear. Alas, it wasn’t to be a bear though. He clearly knew what he wanted. Paw Patrol was one of his favourite characters a year back, so I was very surprised when he opted for a Troll over Chase. It was at this point that the Toy Kingdom mascot, Mr. Frog, appeared, surprising us all but delighting the kids, including our son who had been looking forward to meeting him from the moment we arrived.
He eventually finished making his Troll and I loved how he was made to warm up the Troll’s heart before it was inserted. Confusing our son a little at the time, he finally understood what was expected. He even got the opportunity to capture all the details about his Troll and finished this activity by printing a birth certificate for the Troll too.
Our time at Toy Kingdom, Sandton City was definitely a memorable one for all three of us. Full of fun and excitement with a large variety of toys to make any child happy. To close off an amazing morning with our son, he found a dinosaur he had been looking for a while now. “Blue”, one of the raptor hybrids from the Jurassic World movie was on sale along with a host of other dinosaur and human ‘characters’ from the same movie. Let’s just say we have an extremely happy son who was able to experience the most amazing and interactive ‘play experience, made all the more special by the incredible and amazing staff.
Throughout the time we were there we actually got to spend quality time as a family, yeah as crazy as that may seem, it’s true. We got to connect two-on-one aka one-on-one with our son, without being distracted by an app on the iPad or the rugby score on TV. We were so engaged throughout our mini “Amazing Race” experience and visit to Toy Kingdom that we completely forgot about time and that we had other more menial errands to run.
It’s winter school break, and you’re bound to hit a blank at some point and run out of ideas as to how to entertain your child. Don’t fret, give your local Toy Kingdom store a visit and create some new memories, whilst spending some uninterrupted quality time with your child as you browse the shelves and interactive displays. Should you be overwhelmed by the vast range of toys in stock for all ages and undecided as to what to get your child or their friends for a birthday party, Toy Kingdom also has the wonderful option to select a gift voucher instead of a toy.
Visit www.toykingdom.co.za to find the nearest store to you or follow them on Facebook , Instagram or Twitter to stay up to date on all their amazing specials and the latest toy craze to hit our shores.
THANK YOU TOY KINGDOM SANDTON FROM THE!
disclaimer – this is a collaborative post
Looks like a fun family outing. We frequent the Menlyn store and always leave with something ?
It’s amazing how we can’t ever leave empty handed 🙂